Formula One racing team Williams drove back in to profit last year, despite a disappointing season on the track, helped by a one-off payment from an outgoing sponsor.

State-owned Venezuelan oil company PDVSA paid out for an early termination of its sponsorship deal after Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado left Williams over the winter for Lotus after a difficult season for the driver.

The payment, which is believed to be in the region of £15m, helped to push the former world champion to report an operating profit of £12m, a turnaround after having lost £5m the previous year.

The return to profit will be welcome news for shareholders and comes just a few weeks after the racing team signed Italian drinks company Martini as its new title sponsor.

There has also been a pickup in performance of the team under the guidance of Claire Williams, deputy team principal of the Formula One team and daughter of the founder, Sir Frank Williams.

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Williams has already scored 36 points after four races this season, having managed only five in the whole of last season.

The results also showed that the team's advanced engineering business, it is developing to commercialize its racing technology, reported a modest £0.1m increase in income over the past year to £15.6m.

The group confirmed it had closed a technology centre it had set up in Qatar where it employed around 30 people. The work and some of the staff have been moved back to its headquarters in Oxfordshire, part of what is known as "Motor Sport Valley" in the heart of England.

Sir Frank said his team had made good progress commercially, despite a disappointing 2013 season on-track, in which the squad scored just five points and finished ninth in the constructors' championship.

"We have started the 2014 Formula One season well and hope we can continue to improve our performance," Sir Frank said.

Group CEO Mike O'Driscoll added that the signing of key technical personnel such as Pat Symonds, a long-term engine deal with Mercedes, and its title-sponsorship deal with Martini, showed Williams was moving in the right direction.

"We began the process of refocusing and restructuring midway through last year and we are making good progress," he added.

"The Group has invested in a new, state-of-the-art advanced engineering facility at our UK headquarters, which has also enabled us to streamline our operations and close our Qatar facility.